With an average of 34 Filipinos dying from road accidents daily and causing the deaths of those aged 15-19, stakeholders gathered on Sunday to support the World Health Organization’s launching of #SaveLives #SlowDown campaign that aims to install speed limiters on automobiles and help save lives.
Senator Grace Poe, chairman of the Senate public services committee, said it has has been eight months since Republic Act No. 10916 or the law mandating speed limiter for public utility vehicles was put in place but its full implementation remains in jeopardy as delays hound the issuance of the law’s implementing rules and regulations.
Despite Congress’ intentions to pass road safety-related measures to ensure a safer environment for the public, Poe lamented that the framework for effectively implementing RA 10916 was still not being realized.
Senator JV Ejercito earlier filed the Child Safety in Motor Vehicles Act of 2017 that proposed the use of a child restraint system to protect infants and children from the impact of auto collision and the Anti-Overloading Act of 2017 which sought to prevent a repeat of accidents like the case of the overloaded bus that fell into a ravine in Nueva Ecija last month.
During the gathering at the Music Hall of the Mall of Asia in Pasay City, road safety advocates from both the government and private sectors vowed to raise awareness and implement reforms to educate the public on the importance of road safety and the need to address the grim statistics in recent years.
Coinciding with the United Nations-led Global Road Safety, SM Supermalls and SM Cares hosted the Safe Kids Worldwide Philippines (SKWP), Safe Kids Worldwide Network, Global Alliance of NGOs for Road Safety, Motorcycle Development Program Participants Association, Inc. and the WHO event.
Royce Cabunag, director of SM Cares Program on Children and Youth, said, “In this fast-paced world, not everything needs to move at the speed of light, and the road is definitely a place where slowing down is vital and lifesaving.”
Cabunag noted that SM Cares is a proud partner in this advocacy to protect and save lives, especially that of the children. Its advocacies include Programs on Persons with Disabilities, Senior Citizens, Women and Breastfeeding, Children and Youth, OFW (or SM Global Pinoy), Social Entrepreneurship and Environment and Sustainability.
WHO Health Systems Team Leader Benjamin Lane said reducing speed even by just 1 kilometer per hour will save lives.
Mark De Leon, Assistant Secretary of Department of Transportation and Communications said they are set to implement various programs that will make roads safer to everyone.
“We are proposing the installation of speed limit devices in all our public utility vehicles as well as dashcams and CCTVs for the protection of not only our riding public but pedestrians. DOTC will make sure our roads are safer,” he said.
Jocelyn Yambao-Franco, President of SWKP, pointed the need to slow down on the road as she cited that worldwide, an estimated 1.25 million die and over 50 million are injured on road crashes annually and by 2020, road traffic crashes are expected to increase by 80 percent in low and middle income countries due to increasing motorization
Jesus De la Fuente, Executive Director of SKWP agreed, saying that a large portion of fatal road crashes are caused by speeding.
“A great portion of our road traffic crashes especially those that are fatal are caused by speeding and it has already proven that a 5% cut in average speed can result in a 30% reduction in the number of fatal road traffic crashes. This is what we hope to achieve in this event,” De la Fuente stressed.
“Government data show transport-related crashes in the country have increased sharply from 15,572 in 2014 to 24, 565 in 2016,” said the SKWP official.
SKWP is a member of Safe Kids Global Network with more than 30 member countries and 400 coalitions in United Stated and Global Alliance of NGOs for Road Safety more than 170 member NGOs working in road safety from more than 90 countries around the world
Local government executives from the cities of Paranaque, Pasay and Quezon have also pledged their commitment to the SaveLives#SlowDown campaign by enacting appropriate ordinances in their own cities and barangays to implement speed limits.
In 2011, the World Health Organization launched the Decade of Action for Road Safety prescribing a framework designed to curb the rising number of road traffic injuries and fatalities in the World. Following the 2011 Framework on Road Safety, the Philippines’ Department of Transportation spearheaded the Philippine Road Safety Action Plan (PRSAP) 2011-2020 with the goal of reducing road traffic crashes by the year 2020.